Reader Review: Soda-Club Seltzer Water Soda Maker

Ilene was the winner of a Soda-Club Seltzer Water Soda Maker in a Thursday Giveaway. We've been thinking about this machine as the weather warms and fizzy drinks sound more appealing. Here is Ilene's review!

This unusual appliance looks like a space pod landed in my kitchen.

After unwrapping, it was a bit of a difficult assembly managing the various parts and booklets. There's a CD video demonstration, but I haven't viewed this as the booklet was sufficient.

Getting started was a bit tricky (installing the carbonation unit was the trickiest). After I assembled the carbonator, bottle, I tapped the top button demanding soda, but no fizzies. What was wrong? It takes a strong push, not a ladylike tap, to get it going, and once I learned how to do it right I got soda. Lots of it.

I tried a couple of flavors: first the root beer, and it was serviceable. The diet lemon/lime was not as good, but little flavor pouches don't last more than once, so the suffering is short if you hate them. If you like your seltzer with flavor, cheaper syrup is available from the supermarket.

The instructions state that only water is to be used in the soda maker, so forget about carbonating iced tea or coffee as I was hoping to.

Recommended product if you like to belch and willing to pay for it. Thumbs up.

Faith is executive editor of The Kitchn and author of three cookbooks, including the James Beard Award-winning The Kitchn Cookbook, coauthored with Sara Kate Gillingham, as well as Bakeless Sweets. She lives in Columbus, Ohio with her husband Mike.